St. Ignatius of Antioch is one of the earliest of the early Church fathers. Only Clement of Rome leaves us a written record that is earlier (outside the New Testament, and the Didache, which is anonymous). Ignatius was the bishop of Antioch, in Syria, arrested for spreading the Christian faith - and because he was the bishop, and taken to Rome for execution. Along the way he wrote letters to the Christians in cities where he (apparently) knew the bishop and his colleagues had asked him to write letters of encouragement to their churches. These letters are a very early and important witness to several aspects of the early Church, including the hierarchy and the office of bishop. He was martyred in the Colosseum in Rome in about the year 110.

This morning - as I often do on a saint's feast day - I wanted to ask St. Ignatius of Antioch for his intercession. I found myself asking him to pray for me in my role as husband and father, provider and protector for my family. Like many of you, I assume, my immediate family includes people who live under my roof, and people who don't (my sons are grown and married, and have roofs of their own). I have learned from experience that when your children move out and are on their own, that's when you really learn that you can't protect them, and you have to rely on God. So I ask the saints to pray with me for them. Ignatius of Antioch worried about his people, the Christians of Antioch, as he was being taken away, but he said he had peace about it because now Jesus himself would be their bishop. (They did eventually get another bishop, of course, but you get the idea.) So as our children create families of their own, we pray that someone even better than us will fill in for the roles we can't fulfill in person all the time. That God would be their father, and Mary would be their mother, and the Church would be their home and family.

I'm reminded of a prayer that St. Mother Teresa prayed regularly - short and sweet, it was: "Mary, Mother of God, be Mother to me now."

I'm also reminded of a song by John Michael Talbot, which is really a prayer for those who have let their connection to the Church slip away, or who have fallen into watered down expressions of Christianity - the song goes something like this:

"Come home, home, little children
Come home, come home to stay
Come home to a Father who loves you
Come home to a Mother who prays..."